The Ideology of Confucianism in Western Han and an Analysis of Its Causes

People in of Pre-Qin period were entitled to freedom of thought and expressing their own views without being limited by any standard or authority.Different thoughts existed in the same time.However,thinkers in the ancient time held that chaos in thought would lead to chaos in society,thus hoping to achieve unification in thought.There was still no mainstream thought in society before the period of Emperor Wudi of Western Han.The proposal of Abolishing all thoughts and developing by Dong Zhongshu was adopted by the authorities.Confucianism obtained a leading role as the official mainstream ideology.Reasons why Confucianism rose from one of the hundred contending schools of thoughts and became the unique official ideology and was widely accepted are as follows: Confucianism had the earliest cultural origin and most profound social influences;it could provide support for the legality of reign of Western Han;it could help to maintain the authority of monarchy and social order;and it could solve some practical problems of that time to a certain extent.